Welcome to the Capital
by Phaaze22
Summary: A young Turian's family moves to Earth after a job offer with an un-refuseable salary. Neyal Matarian must now learn how to grow accustomed to life on Earth, and find out that there is perhaps more to the outside World than what he learned on Palaven.
1. Chapter 0  Prologue

A sudden woosh could be heard on the inside of the ship as the mass relay jump reached its conclusion. The world that could be seen outside the reinforced window seemed to become more real, albeit emptier and more dull.

Just as it always would.

Truth be told, this was the first time I had taken part in one of these, the experience was meant to be new. I could have imagined any of the other younglings staring wide eyed out through the window, watching the streams of apparent light in the mass free space-time corridor, but captivate me they did not. I had spent most of the voyage sitting alone, not even in the vicinity of my parents, either thinking to myself or observing the passers by.

To my surprise, many came over to ask if I was alright and maybe share a moment of conversation. The asari on the ship, especially, always promised friendliness as such, even to one of another race. They most often seemed to surprised when I told them of my age, complimenting me with a social ability that was apparently "beyond my years". I brushed it off as too many years of having to deal with over-excitable children who had an inability to know when not to speak. I thanked them nonetheless, remembering my manners. I brushed a talon against my fringe and let myself sigh, as we broke free of the Charon relay and the FTL drives engaged into full throttle, soon speeding past Pluto and Neptune.

As we passed Uranus, my sight was caught by a relatively large ship, named the "Normandy SR-2" and adorned with a logo that seemed to attract looks of distaste among the most of the adults on the ship; provoking a few mumbled discussions involving insults in several different languages, left un-translated by my ear piece for reasons I assumed were obvious. Strangest of all, however, was the fact that this ship seemed to be in the act of launching several mining probes to land on Uranus's surface. I had remembered from what little I had learnt about the Sol Cluster that Uranus was near to depleted of resources, due to Helium-3 retrieval once humans had developed FTL drives. Regardless, the ship seemed very keen to keep launching probes; I soon grew tried of observing it and returned to my former position, attempting to lie down and sleep for a moment or two.

This plan was foiled by my mother calling out to me, coming over and insisting to sit by my side, wanting to talk about something. She sat down and looked at me, with eyes of concern piercing my gaze.

"You've been awfully quiet during the whole trip, your father and I are worried. What is the matter?" she asked me, in the same tone you'd expect any worried mother to address their son.

"I promise, I'm fine." I assured her, putting on a slightly fake smile in an attempt to please her and alleviate her concern.

"Listen, you don't have to pretend you're OK if that's not how you actually feel. I know this is an awfully big change, I felt sad as well knowing we would have to leave Palaven and everything we'd ever taken as home. But…"

"I know, I know…" I interrupted, slightly rudely, I admit, but felt to be necessary nonetheless "…the one hundred thousand credits a month salary was too good to refuse and will give us the life we've always wanted. Please, mother, don't worry about me. I understand that this is necessary and that in the long run this will be a good thing. I promise you, I will be fine" I finished, speaking from the heart.

"Thank you, son. You've been too good to us" She responded, embracing me in her arms. I returned the gesture; thereafter she released me and walked off up the stairs to the next deck. I laid back down and prepared to attempt sleep once more, not wanting to dwell on the partial lie I had just told my mother and telling myself I did it for the greater good of keeping her happy.

My thoughts were invaded by a memory of a group of friends, waving goodbye as the ship I was on right now left Palaven, and began the ascent into outer space. It seemed like a lifetime ago, but I knew it was not, merely a day or two in reality. I reached into the back of my casuals and retrieved the physical version of the memory from them. I opened the hologram and saw their faces again. A mixture of sadness, happiness, and other emotions for which I had no name. The names of the people repressed themselves in my mind, confronting me with the truth that remembering them would bring more harm than good. Remember them, I of course still did, but now was not the time to do so. Taking what I hoped would be the last of many sighs I had on the trip, I put the hologram back into the pocket and closed my eyes, relying on the dreams to clear my thoughts.

Unfortunately, once again, I was interrupted, but this time by a message beginning to play on the ship's audio announcement system.

"Attention all passengers, we are just now passing by Mars and are on course to land on Earth in approximately 10 earth minutes. Please return to the main hallway and fasten yourselves into the safety harnesses to ensure lack of injury during landing. T-9 minutes to landing zone. Thank you"

I heaved myself off of the recliner and walked up the same stairs my mother had before, eventually spotting both her and my father amongst the rows of seats. I smiled and waved at them as I approached, sitting in the seat adjacent to my father and fastening the harness as instructed. We looked out of the front window to enjoy the only spectacle we'd get as we landed. 8 became 7 and 7 became 6. Soon enough the numbers did not matter. The seats were eventually all filled, including the other one adjacent to mine, by a human of the same age as my parents. He leaned over me and said only one thing:

"Welcome to the capital, Turian!"


	2. Chapter 1

The rest of the approach was smooth, albeit quite a sight. The world outside the window appeared to set alight, and soon the only thing that would prevent us from fueling it with our own bodies would be the the reinforced plating surrounding the ship's exterior. I felt something grab onto my right hand; my mother's talon, gently grabbing mine. I returned the gesture, and tried to keep a relaxed breathing pattern to distract myself as we approached nearer and nearer to the planet. I was tempted to close my eyes at one point, as if that would somehow decrease the risk of collision, but I ultimately decided against it, realizing it wouldn't make a difference. My worries were soon relieved as at last, we broke through the edge of the earth and we could afford to slow down. The fireball that seemed to surround the window soon dissipated and at long last, we got our first glimpse at the earth. Though, at the moment, all we could see were what could only be described as gatherings of white dust. A few of the non-human passengers, sat agape. For me, it was a not too unfamiliar sight.

"I guess clouds also appear back on Palaven, huh?" The man who had talked to me before suddenly pondered in my direction, noting my lack of response to the cloud cover. I set some more time aside this time, to get a better idea of his appearance. As I guessed earlier from his voice, he was about the same age as both my parents, somewhere in the region of 40-50 years old. He had a sharpness about his demeanor that gave the impression of many battles fought, but not just of the physical kind. His black colored eyes accented this. On the other hand, his impish stature told of a want to maintain a degree of youth, or perhaps it was just a matter of that simply being who he was. I ultimately decided to answer his question in a more extensive manner, creating a conversation.

"Palaven is quite similar to Virmire in weather actually. The weak gravitational core mostly affects the radiation levels, not so much the cloud cover and rain cycles" I replied, explaining my lack of a reaction.

"Oh, yeah, I see. What's a little guy like you doing on a ship to Earth anyway? I'm guessing those are your parents behind you." he said, nodding to them in the seats on the other side of me.

"Yeah, they are. Well, how can I best put it…" I organized my thoughts for a few moments, and then gave my answer "...apparently you, as in, humans, have been short on document translators recently?" I opened with a question, to make sure this person had a vague idea of what I'd be talking about.

"I saw that on a recent news feed. I gotta admit, I was confused, isn't all translating done automatically by computers now? You'd think with today's technology it'd be possible."

This was the answer I was expecting. I gave in return the expected explanation.

"Most of it is, but for important documents, ones that need to be sent from government to government, they need actual translators to make sure that everything sent contains no errors of any sort. Computers are prone to translate too literally sometimes, and no one wants to risk a conflict just because one word was mistranslated, as we know has happened in declarations of the past. My mother just so happens to speak fluent English as well as our native language; our family always being involved in politics and the like, she was given a job opportunity as Turian Translator/Ambassador on Earth. Let's just say the salary was one that couldn't be refused." I finished, trailing off.

"Man, tough break. So you just decided to move like that?" He said, with a hint of empathy in his voice.

"Well, I have to be honest, I don't mind. What matters most of all is that they're happy with what we're doing, I should be supportive." I stated assertively. At this he smiled, and allowed himself a small grunt of a chuckle.

"Damn, it's true what they about you." He remarked, piquing my interest.

"What do you mean?"

"You Turians really do put everyone else before yourself. Crazy fools." He shook his head, in disappointment or lack of understanding, I could not tell which, though I chuckled all the same.

I wondered if all humans were like him, and if that was the case, would that be a positive thing or a negative thing?

The man finally turned back to observe the front window, where we could see we had finally broken through the clouds and were now on our way to the London Spaceport. Something that fascinated me about the Earth was how even just upon its own surface, you would find more variety than you would in some entire star systems. In its own nations and cultures, on one side of the earth you would find humans leading a completely different attitude to life than a group of humans on the other side. That was something that wasn't often seen back home, if ever. It was something I was sure I would find out more about during my stay here, and in that sense, I was truthfully looking forward to it. On the same token…

...my train of thought was interrupted by an increase in volume as the ship slammed hard on the air brakes and pulled in slowly to dock. The pilot misjudged the landing by a fraction and ended up grating against the connection from the ship's door to the dock, making a grating sound that sounded like a Varren's roar; it made me and a few others cringe. Soon thereafter the grating stopped, signifying we had finally arrived, as I counted on the announcement system kindly reminding us, right on cue.

"We have now arrived at the Paul McCartney Space port in London, England. Current earth time is 10:45 PM on a 24 hour clock system. Outside temperature is a comfortable 23 degrees Celsius or 296 degrees Kelvin. Please unfasten your seat belts and disembark through the main hull exit to pass through decontamination and immigration. Thank you for traveling with Quantas Spaceways, we hope you've had a pleasant voyage."

"Come on Neyal, we don't want to end up at the back of the queue" My father called out to me as he got out of his seat, and my mother did the same. I undid my harness and followed them closely out of the main hall, onto the deck and through the main door onto the dock. I took one last look back at the metal heap that had transported us from home to here, and couldn't help but feel amazed. For the first time, I realized what a journey I had just made, almost taken for granted. I could not tell at the time what architecture it was, but I also didn't care. I had an admiration for the construction that I simply didn't realize I had before, no matter who had built it.

"One day…" I remember saying to myself "...I will build something that attracts as much wonder as that"

I turned around to find my parents waving at me to come over, before I got lost. I hurriedly rushed back to them and followed them through the long, boring, and indescribable process of immigration that I will not describe here for the sake of whoever's reading this and my own sanity attempting to make a record of it.


	3. Chapter 2

After much deliberation, we finally made it through immigration. I looked down at the little metal projector I held in my left talon; the only reward from hours of interrogations and form filling. Pressing the button on the top would show all the information you would ever need to know about me, in the form of an upright projection:

ID Disk - For emigration Purposes

Name: Neyal Matarian

Species: Turian

Age: 12

Mother: Yalen Matarian

Father: Trelis Matarian

ID Number: 560934659234705

Turian Specific info:

Skin tone: White

Family Clan Marking Colour: Black

Some more information was also present, such as our new address and contact number, as well as an actual projection of myself that obviously cannot be shown here. Something that the Disk did not note was that though my family's clan marking were black, I had not myself undergone Military service training, due to not yet having come of age, so I was still barefaced. Not that I cared that much. I did wonder if I would have to go back home when that time came around, but it seemed so far away, I thought there wasn't much point in dwelling on it. My parents had also received ID disks and were examining their own. They clearly weren't keen on the idea; their annoyance was plain to tell.

"I swear, that whole time, that damn immigration officer was looking at me as if I was a rabid Krogan. Some of these humans are so racist!" My dad exclaimed in anger, having to be held back by my mother from doing something he'd regret: punching a nearby citizen. He eventually relaxed; contorting his brow seemed to work for him to release any stress buildup, it had become a little mannerism. Throughout the whole ordeal, I said nothing, simply due to having nothing to say.

The main lobby, a building just as bland and decrepit as the corridors that confined our passage into the human world, failed to make any of us feel any better. Even if any of the shops we had encountered were interesting, we didn't have time to go to them, as a taxi was already waiting outside to pick us up. We noiselessly made our way through the main lobby, passing by the thousands of humans, turians, salarians and countless others going about their business, just as we were, divided only by appearance; we eventually reached the door spotted our shuttle taxi waiting for us outside. All of our luggage was being transported to our house by other means, so we did not have to wait at baggage claim to pick it up (Something that, if what the humans say is anything to go by, hasn't improved since the late 20th century) and did not have to load it into the taxi shuttle; by this point that was one of the only things my parents were thankful about.

As we got into the shuttle and it took off, the driver beginning to engage in a conversation with my father, I found myself suddenly unable to join in, my normally talkative nature being withheld by some subconscious force within my mind. It irked me significantly; no matter how many times I tried to speak up, the words abstained. I instead decided to listen in on what they were saying:

"I tell you what, I can't even remember the last time I gave a lift to a single turian, let alone a whole family. Makes a change, I have to say." said the surprisingly young human driver. He couldn't have been more than twenty five; for some reason I had imagined that the typical human taxi driver would be much older. From what I could see of his face in the rear view mirror, his complexion fit his age; confident, but fairly neutral in expression. I remembered well because most of the time, I found myself staring into his eyes curiously, which he eventually took notice of and spoke directly at me.

"What, you never seen a human before, little guy?" he said, a statement that perhaps would make me feel slightly uncomfortable normally, but, with the way he said it and with the smile that accompanied it, instead felt like a piece of warm banter. Regardless, I replied with a weak smile, and a slight retreat into my seat. This made the driver look slightly upset. He turned his eyes back to the road and spoke at me again.

"I'm sorry, was it something I said?"

I snapped my head up suddenly.

"No, no, not at all!" I was quick to assure him. "I just…" I paused to think for a moment. Why _was_ I shying away from this seemingly friendly man? I had no prejudice against humans, or anyone for that matter. Truth be told, I expected when I arrived that I'd be talking around as much as possible, trying to make new friends to make myself less saddened at the loss of the old ones. But all I was doing here was trying my hardest to depress myself. "...am a little shuttle-lagged, that's all." I eventually finished, thinking that would likely be seen as a reasonable excuse.

"I don't blame ya, the Palaven to Earth route ain't easy. I should know, one of my brothers used to serve as an envoy for the Alliance." He revealed, suddenly catching the attention of my father.

"Your brother went to Palaven often?" he asked, taking a moment to glance out of the window.

"God, he used to rave about the place. I don't know how he got around with all the differences in food, climate and the like, but sometimes I could have sworn he liked it over there more than he did here." He took a sudden left turn to avoid an incoming police car, sending all of us slightly sideways. We straightened up again and I shook my head.

"What do you think that was?" I asked, trying to get a glimpse of the Police car again.

"Probably just a routine patrol. Sometimes they need to go into incoming traffic to tail a runaway, it's pretty common."

My mandible subconsciously twitched.

"Don't you worry though, the London police force is just about the best on the planet. Never used to be that way though; if you told someone that 100 years ago, they'd have laughed you all the way down to the pub."

"A pub?" said the three of us in unison. He chuckled quite loudly at that.

"You'll find out the quirks of English life soon enough." He leaned over his steering wheel slightly, looking out and noticing something in the distance.

"Oh, never mind now, we're almost at your destination. The Guyver building, right? It's just round this corner."

Sure enough, a few seconds later, the taxi pulled up outside the Guyver building, and the doors opened for us. We got out, my dad paid the fare and thanked the driver. Before he left, he beckoned me over to him and I leaned over the window to talk to him.

"Listen, I can tell you're a bunch of good people, I'm not sure how many contacts you have around here, but at least have my card. If you ever need a ride, or anything else for that matter, just give me a call, alright?" I was taken aback at this sudden act of kindness, but I was thankful regardless and happily accepted the card. With that, he waved us goodbye with a salute, and drove off into the unrelenting airtraffic once again. I turned around and gazed upwards at the towering spire that would be my home for the foreseeable future.

The Guyver building was a ground-based structure located by the big river that flows through London, which I had learned was called the river Thames. It resembled a vertical, pointed ellipse in shape, with the the outside of the building painted a reflective light purple. Amongst the metallic blues and greys that made up the rest of the buildings in the surrounding area, it stuck out like a sore thumb (In it's colour, quite literally). It was meant to be one of the most desirable living spaces in the whole country, I could only hope it was as impressive on the inside as it was on the out. On the ground floor, a beautifully arranged marble plaza, with planted trees arranged neatly in holdings of soil. Whether it was a synthetic substitute, as had become so popular recently, for the real thing or not, I wasn't sure, but the trees seemed healthy enough, so I paid it no attention. A massive digital clock adorned floor on the walk up to the reception, blaring the time at all that walked over it - 13:37 PM earth time. I already knew that Earth had a 24 solar hour rotational period, so we were now already past the middle of the day, or as the humans called it - Afternoon. We walked up to the front desk where we were greeted with the typical peppy excitement of VI receptionist

"Welcome to the Guyver building, you must be the new residents! My name is Gaia, and I am your receptionist, I am programmed to help in many ways, including…"

"Look, Gaia, apologies for interrupting, but we're tired and we've had a long day, could you please just tell us how to get into our apartment." My dad interrupted; clearly he wasn't in the mood for dealing with a VI right now.

"Understood, most certainly. As you probably already know, your apartment is number 123, in block C. Simply press the tip of your first talon on the door to open it, it has already been programmed with all three of your signatures. Is there anything else I can do, sir?"

"No, that would be all, thank you." He scratched the back of his fringe with his right talon and started making his way to the elevator of Block C. I looked at my mother, but she simply shrugged and followed suit, as did I. On the way down the carpeted corridor, I overheard a news stream on a nearby screen.

"The prison ship Purgatory seems to have has come under catastrophic damage, with fleeing prisoners now being rescued by Citadel authorities. Reporters are just now making their way to the scene, more on this story as it develops."


	4. Chapter 3

Truth be told, the rest of that day wasn't as eventful as you might have thought. By the time we had finished organizing our belongings and getting settled into the new apartment, the earth's sun could already be spotted disappearing beyond the horizon line. I observed the event from the confines of my bedroom; It was a sight that I treasured, so different from the sunsets back home. It reminded me, like nothing else that day had done, that moving here was a new experience for me, one that not many of my companions would be able to share.

I decided to count my blessings instead of my misfortunes. To further contribute to the positivity, I remembered that such a thing as technology existed, and realized that I could at any time contact my friends back at home using any of the extranet FTL services. I turned on my Omni tool in excitement; an excitement abruptly ended by the fact that I realized I had no connection to any extra comm points at the moment.

I sighed in disappointment and resigned to sitting on my bed and reading through a magazine that I had found sprawled on the floor; left by whoever lived here before. Their hobby was interesting to say the least; it was a magazine dedicated entirely to these fictional creatures called Pokemon. The first article detailed on the history of these creatures and how their franchise evolved from its conception in 1996, in the country of Japan, to today, where battles between these creatures took place in real time, virtual auditoriums all over the world. I had remembered hearing a bit about this Earth cultural phenomenon back in History lessons on Palaven, but this article alone made the extent of it seem much larger than I could have ever imagined it to be. I was just about to read more of the magazine when my father walked into the room.

"Hello son. What are you reading there?"

I for some reason, felt the need to quickly hide the magazine, as if being caught with it was some sort of embarassment to myself.

"Oh! Er… nothing dad" I was quick to reply, slyly attempting to hide the magazine under the cover of the bed, but dad being the sense sharpened turian he was saw through the ruse and started peering through it.

"Hmm, how interesting. A media franchise becomes a cultural phenomenon." He considered, with genuine intrigue. His eyes slowly gravitated closer to the pages, as he became engrossed in reading. "Where did you find this anyway? We haven't been past any shops where you could have bought it, and all your money is with us anyway."

"It was right here on the bed, oddly." I answered, genuinely. "Must have been left here by whoever lived here before."

All of a sudden what seemed like a flash of realization flashed across my dad's eye.

"Oh of course, I remember the receptionist mentioning that the previous owners may have left something behind. They were quite keen to get it back, actual printed magazines are normally only specially issued. Do you mind if I take it back now? I'm sure they wouldn't mind if you just wanted to finish reading it." Dad asked, still thumbing through a few of the pages himself.

"Nah, best to give it back as soon as possible. I'm sure I can think of something else to do." I said to my dad, with a reassuring smile.

"Alright then." He chuckled, and then asked the question I was hoping he wouldn't ask. "But why on Pala… I mean, earth did you feel the need to hide this from me? It's just a magazine." He said, and although he meant it in a friendly way, to me it felt like an overbearing load of shame. I sulked back onto my bed and quietly whispered

"I… don't know."

My dad, though he looked slightly concerned, thought it would be best not to stay on the matter further and left with a quick goodbye. I meekly waved him off. The minute he closed the door, I let out a frustrated groan at myself; why had I made such an ordeal of the magazine? I never liked it when I made something more complicated then needed be for seemingly no reason, and I always went down on myself hard whenever I did it. A destructive habit, and one I wanted to get rid of. Something easier said than done, as the humans put it. I ended up resigning to to staring at the ceiling whilst lying on my bed, eventually falling asleep from the day's weariness.

"No, I don't want him to go, it's far too early and we can't send him there!"

"Yalen, we have been over this so many times, no where else in London offers the same level of education. He'll be with people of his own kin there, he might feel less homesick."

"We are living on Earth! How can we expect to integrate into human society if we refuse to even send our son into an all Turian school? We're not exactly one in a billion here, even if we were to send him to a school now, there are other turians in the regular schools, and our son needs to be able to make human friends as well! "

Those were the sounds of my mother and father having some sort of argument in the living room. At first I was still in that small time period in the morning after waking up where things don't make much sense, but as my mind awoke fully, I realized what they were arguing about. They were arguing about me.

"But what if he becomes the target of racial jokes? You saw how that immigration officer acted yesterday, what if there are more humans like him, just waiting on an innocent figure like our son to prey on?" That was definitely my dad's voice. It sounded like he did not want me to go a school with humans in it, and instead to go to a Turian only school. I did not even know such schools existed on earth, but even if they did, I certainly did not want to go to one. What would be the point in living on earth if I was not to meet new people? Despite my objections I decided to keep on listening in instead of interjecting, driven by the want to hear the truth.

"You cannot just judge an entire species on one man! What about the friendly taxi driver from yesterday? He was certainly very helpful, what if there are more humans like him? We cannot live in fear of humans, especially considering we're living on their home planet!" My mother insisted, sounding more irritated with noticeable rise in her voice; she was almost shouting. The room was silent for a moment. A long moment. Then my mother spoke up again.

"...I am sorry, I shouldn't have raised my voice. I just want the best for our son."

"Doesn't every parent?" My dad asked rhetorically, before switching to an apologetic tone himself.

"I'm sorry too, I…"

At that moment, I accidentally leaned too much on my bedroom door, and the noise of it opening was enough to draw the attention of my parents. I stumbled out, feeling a mixture of embarrassment and frustration at my own foolishness. I decided to speak up to prevent any awkward questions and cover up my own inadequacy.

"I heard you arguing; I didn't want to interrupt." were the words I hurried out of my mouth, before I had the chance to think about other ones to say.

"Oh darling, come here…" she beckoned me over, I went to her and she hugged me, wanting to comfort me.

"We're sorry if we woke you up, I'm not sure how much you heard but we were just discussing where to send you to school, you needn't have worried about interrupting."

"In fact…" my dad interjected "...maybe you could help us decide. You see…"

"I know…" I interrupted myself "...you'd rather I'd go to an all Turian school, and mother would like me to go to a regular mixed school. And honestly, I want to go to a mixed school." I finished, leaving my father with a surprised expression in his eyes.

"Really son? But, aren't you worried about what the humans might think of you? That they could be mean to you?" He asked, with that same tone of concern as before.

"But I'll never find out unless I go. I could just as easily be bullied by a fellow turian as by a human, and I really want to make new friends here. Please dad, let me go a regular school." I pleaded, trying to win him over. He seemed to furrow his brow, then he leaned his head against his talon and drew out a sigh, before finally saying:

"Alright then, you can go. But; the minute anyone, and I mean anyone tries to push you around, don't you dare be afraid to stand up for yourself, alright? You have just as much a right to be there as everyone else there, and no one should be allowed to make you feel otherwise." He asserted, to which I replied with a confident "Yes!" After my dad left the room and went to the kitchen, my mother chuckled and looked at me with a slight air of bewilderment and turned to me.

"Your father can be so stubborn sometimes, but I'm glad he saw reason this time. But listen here now: whilst he was right about you standing up for yourself, that does not mean you have a right to start any fights whenever you feel like it. You do not want to get into trouble for no reason after all." My mother warned, to which I sighed and dissapointment.

"You know that's not me…"

"I know that dear, but all the same, please be careful." She squeezed me again, and I hugged back. "I don't want you getting into a scuffle!"

"I won't mother, I promise." I said, before heading off to watch a vid on my omni tool.

I wish it was a promise I could have kept.


End file.
